The Arrow Summer 2021

President’s Paragraph

I couldn’t see six feet in front of me. A few years ago I was fishing on a very familiar lake in Canada and our small boat was suddenly enveloped by a heavy afternoon fog. I was at the motor and it was so unnerving. My friends and I weren’t exactly in danger—all we had to do was stop the boat and wait a while for the fog to lift—but it was one of the most surreal experiences of my life. That hour on Lake of the Woods, Ontario, resembles in no small measure how I felt for months at a time here at OHA this past year, a time shrouded with the unrelenting pressures of the Covid pandemic. We were feeling our way forward in a familiar place, yet under very unfamiliar conditions; my years of experience and well-considered plans had to be altered on the fly—there was no roadmap to follow; I found myself having to wait for something that was completely out of my control to change; I tried to model calmness and exhibit leadership when the future was fuzzy and uncertain to everyone, including me! And, yet, on April 17, 2021, some fourteen months after the onset of the pandemic, twenty-seven new graduates of Oak Hill Academy turned their mortarboard tassels, received their high school diplomas, and continued the legacy of our school in this our 142 nd year. Yes, the fog of 2020 has partially dissipated and we have made it safely back to shore here in Mouth of Wilson. The lessons of the past year are many: OHA is now and forever shall be an “in-person” school … Zoom cannot replicate the community that forms here on campus; when a group of people like our Faculty and Staff unite under a common

cause and do so in the best interest of a noble endeavor like the OHA mission, obstacles and hurdles shrink under the weight of a community that works together; with so much negative talk about “today’s adolescents,” the resiliency of our students this year was striking … we required much and pushed often in order to make the “OHA Bubble” work and our students rose to the challenge at nearly every turn. I was so proud to step to the podium and welcome our guests to Oak Hill Academy’s 142 nd Commencement Exercises. Every year at the beginning of the ceremony, after listing all of the continents and states of our graduates, I state aloud: “Where in God’s wide wide world would such a diverse group be assembled? Why, nowhere else but right here, in Mouth of Wilson of Virginia, home to Oak Hill Academy. It is indeed a loving and mysterious God who could assemble such a diverse group of people in such a special place. It is indeed a day of celebration, it is indeed a day the Lord hath made, let us rejoice and be glad in it.” Yes, let us rejoice. The fog has lifted, we made it through. In fact, Year 143 on “The Hill” is already underway.

My best,

Michael D. Groves, Ph.D. President

Follow Dr. Groves on Twitter @DrGrovesOHA.